The trigger that won’t get pulled

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My pal Dan Clifton over at the Strategas Group gives his superinformed two cents:

First, healthcare has served a liability to the Democratic Party and we believe the Administration is making a political argument that doing nothing will hurt the party but doing something may or may not help the party and their reelection prospects. The only potential upside from here is to do something.

We also believe the moderate Democratic Senators can be pushing this trigger idea for the public plan knowing it will never go into effect as is the case with the pharmaceutical prescription drug program.

This last point is key because the rules set up for the trigger will determine the impact this legislation will have on managed care. We donâ€™t believe the moderate Democratic Senators will sign off on a bill that will allow the cannibalization from private to government healthcare plans.

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James Pethokoukis is the Money & Politics columnist for Reuters Breakingviews. Previously, he was the business editor and economics columnist for U.S. News & World Report. Pethokoukis has written for many publications including The New York Times, The Weekly Standard, Commentary, USA Today, and Investor's Business Daily. Pethokoukis is also an official CNBC contributor. In addition, he has appeared numerous times on MSNBC, Fox News Channel, Fox Business Network, The McLaughlin Group, CNN, and Nightly Business Report on PBS. A graduate of Northwestern University and the Medill School of Journalism, Pethokoukis is a 2002 Jeopardy! champion. james.pethokoukis@thomsonreuters.com